Down goes a forest

Here's what chasing short-term wealth can do to long-term wellbeing! Malaysia is cutting down forests at more than triple the average rate of the rest of Asia, with the destruction concentrated in the highly biodiverse peatland forests on the island of Borneo, a new analysis of satellite data reveals.

Roughly 10 percent of forests in the Malaysian state of Sarawak on Borneo were cleared in just the past five years, according to the analysis, which was commissioned by Wetlands International, a Netherlands-based environmental group. By comparison, the deforestation rate for the rest of Asia over the past five years was roughly 3.5 percent.

Several threatened and endangered species, including the Sumatran rhino, the Bornean clouded leopard and the Borneo pygmy elephant, are found in Sarawak’s peatland forests.

Same story in many places, like Indonesia and Brazil. Can we come up with a good incentive scheme that will make sure nations keep forests intact? Is REDD a really good scheme? Write in your views.